[Music] Hello good morning and welcome to Lulworth
Cove, Dorset United Kingdom on what is quite a bright and breezy November Autumn morning
For my non-UK viewers I'm going to put up a map now to show you exactly where I am in the UK. Lulworth
Cove is a small fishing Village in Dorset on the south coast of England between the towns of
Weymouth and Poole. Directly across the English Channel is Normandy, France something to note for
later. So the reason I brought you to Lulworth Cove is it's going to be the jumping off point for
our adventure into Tyneham today and I want to demonstrate something to you, although it's not
obvious from the video and I'll show you on a map in a second. On the far side of this Cove, the
high steep Cliffs that you can see now behind me is the start of the UK Ministry of Defence closed
area in Dorset. Why is it closed area? Well for this reason... and you really don't want to venture into
this area under normal circumstances. From where I am filming in Lulworth Cove the 30
square miles due east is a live fire tank and Armored Fighting Vehicle range, the tanks
fire from North to South and then there is a 10 mile danger area out to sea, but it's not the
tanks we've come to Lulworth Ranges to view today, it is a secret hidden the valley in the
range impact area to the south side of the range. The village of Tyneham is not quite a secret, you
can find many stories about the village in the media and also on Wikipedia. It also has various
nicknames in the media: such as the village that died to save Europe... Britain's abandoned World
War II Village... or even the United Kingdom's Pripyat referencing the Ukrainian town that was
abandoned after the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Good news is that for a few days a year the public
can visit the village. But it has to be when the ranges are not live, for obvious reasons. So you
just need to check on the UK MOD website to find out when the range roads are open, and the ranges
are not live. Okay so I've checked online and the MOD says that the range danger area access road is
open today, so what we're going to do now is head up to the car park. Collect my car and we're going to take
a drive up to the range danger area checkpoint , and from there hopefully gain access to Tyneham.
What could be more quintessentially English than driving on a single track road through Villages
of thatched cottages and being stuck behind a slow agricultural tractor, typical! So it takes about 20
minutes to drive to Tyneham from either the west or east access points across the ranges. Obviously
not being stuck behind a tractor. While I'm driving towards Tyneham it gives me an ideal opportunity
to tell you Tynehams backstory and its history. There has been a settlement here since the Iron Age
Circa 800 BC and a settlement was then occupied by the Romans again Circa 1st Century A.D. The village of Tyneham
itself is first mentioned in the Doomsday Book in 1086. Tyneham is a variant of Old English for goat
enclosure, not very flattering Village name is it? In 1683 The Village lands were acquired by The
Bond family. This early photograph shows Tyneham around 1895. and is a view from the village
pond, up the Main Street looking towards the church. This is an Ordnance Survey map dating from
the year 1900 showing the village and its surrounding valley. Tyneham by 1900 was
a civil Parish that covered the whole of the purbeck Valley. Most of the stone-built
structures date from the early to mid 1800s At the peripheries of the village you can
see the manor house called Tyneham House Baltington Hall or Baltongton Farm and Tyneham
Farm, as well as numerous isolated cottages Like most rural villages in England around
1900, and the turn of the 20th century, most of its residents had lived there for many
generations; and by around 1900 there were around 30 multi-generational families living in Tyneham
Village and its surrounding Parish. Now I don't have time in this video to go through the whole
genealogical history of Tyneham, but I'll present you this lady this is 17 year old Helen Beatrice
Taylor taken in 1918.... a typical Tyneham resident From the late 1800s onwards the grass downlands and
open Countryside next to the Villages of Lulworth and Lulworth Cove where I started this video from
at the beginning became popular trading areas for the Victorian British Army, the open Countryside
was ideal for regiment size tented camps; and using the backdrop of the English Channel made
it ideal for musketry , and Gunnery or Cannon practice. This souvenir postcard shows a typical regimental
size temporary tented camp in 1911. But it was the outbreak of World War One just three years later
in 1914 that saw the tented camps become permanent huts, and a permanent Army presence and training
area in the Lulworth region. World War One quickly got bogged down into stalemate and trench warfare.
But it was the invention of the Tank in 1916 that had a profound effect not only on the battlefields
of Flanders, but also on Lulworth. As Lulworth Army training area was chosen to be the place where
replacement trant crews for World War One would be trained. Early British Tanks like these Mark 4s
were slow and lacked range, both automotive range and weapon system range; and therefore did not require
much land to train on. The existing Army training area near Lulworth was more than adequate for Tank
training for World War One. With the end of World War One in 1918, military activity near Lulworth
became minimal... well at least for the next two decades. The Village of Tyneham been unaffected
directly by World War One, as the Army training area was four miles to the West near Lulworth. Life
had continued much as normal, but the village had paid a heavy price. The village and Parish lost
12 men in action during World War One, including all three sons of Emily Taylor... pictured here ... who
then died herself in 1917 probably due to broken heart syndrome! This photograph is Tyneham in 1935.
a similar aspect to the first photograph I showed you, taken from the area of the village pond looking
up the Main Street towards the direction of The Village Church. By now a World War One Memorial
was situated in the church, but life was good in the village, which now had a post office, a
telephone box and access for Motor Vehicles But the village still had no electricity
and apart from one house, no running water Sadly though in 1939 World War II broke out
and this time, this war would affect the village! For the first three and a half years of World
War II life carried on pretty much as normal in Tyneham Village. The army training area was in heavy
use but Purbeck Valley and Tyneham Parish were largely unaffected right up until the 16th
of November 1943, when a bombshell dropped not from a German bomber, but by the postman in
a letter that morning completely out of the blue !! A devastating letter from the War Office
Southern Command notified all residents of Tyneham and surrounding hamlets that their land
and all buildings on it , including the entire Village of Tyneham was being requisitioned for
war use... and they had just 28 days to comply and vacate their homes. No right of appeal simply
a one-line acknowledgment of the pain it would cause to families who had lived in the village
for many generations. Virtually everybody saw it as their patriotic duty to comply with the War
Office order and although they were re-homed and given compensation, most residents did so without
complaint based on a promise that once the war was won, and Hitler was defeated, that they would be
able to return to their family homes in Tyneham. On the 19th of December 1943 in a very poignant
and symbolic gesture Helen Beatrice Taylor ... remember her ... now aged 44, pinned this note to
The Village Church door as she was the symbolic last resident to leave Tyneham. It reads: Please
treat the church and houses with care, we've given up our homes where many of us have lived for
generations to help win the war and keep men free. We will return one day, thank you for
treating The Village kindly. [Music] What the residents of Tyneham couldn't know, at that
time, was a real reason for their removal was to create a wide, live fire training and staging area
for the Allied invasion of Europe, that would take place six months later on June the 6th 1944 in
Normandy. Directly across the English Channel within a further year of fighting Nazi
Germany was defeated and World War II over. Almost immediately after the end of World War
II another, expansionist , totalitarian regime threatened the peace of Europe. The Soviet Union
under Joseph Stalin, and from the late 1940s onwards the UK became embroiled in a Cold War with the
USSR, something that would run for the next four decades. The War Office decided that it needed to
retain its tank training areas for this Cold War and the residents of Tyneham were ultimately
informed, that contrary to the promises made in 1943, their land would now not be returned. It is hard
to put into words the sense of betrayal the Tyneham residents experienced, when the war office told
them they could not return to their homes after World War II. Quite understandable then from the
1950s to the mid-1970s there were numerous legal cases, demonstrations and even attacks on the
Range infrastructure. But by the mid-1970s the Tyneham buildings were in a dilapidated state and
the Army proposed to demolish the whole village. This caused an enormous protest! The result of
the protests, which were backed by politicians was a compromise. In 197, that as far as possible,
The Village would be preserved and open to the public and former residents when the tank ranges
were not live. It is now the year 2022 .. at a time of making this video .. nearly 80 years since
the village was evacuated. Sadly the original residents have all now passed away, even very young
children that time are now very elderly people. Tyneham is a ghost Village, but the promise to
preserve Tyneham and keep it open to the public when the tanks aren't firing is still honored by
the present-day Ministry of Defence and the Army Okay, so that was Tyneham's quite sad and poignant
backstory. But now it's time to explore the present-day village and here we are at the turn
off point for the Range Danger Area checkpoint and we're straight onto our first bit
of historical preservation; at the range danger area checkpoint on the public road is
the original 1930s road sign still showing directions to Tyneham Village four miles away
this is the public side of the range danger area checkpoint. If the ranges are live then
the signs will say roads closed and a five bar gate will be padlocked across the
road with red flags flying as a warning We're now past the checkpoint and driving on
the MOD range road itself, which is very narrow and you'll need to stop frequently to allow
MOD range maintenance traffic to get past you You'll need to drive across the ranges for
about two miles to a Hill called White Hill which overlooks the whole range complex. This
is facing north towards the tank firing area from White hill you'll need to find the
Tyneham access road. and this is it! Point of warning here, just because the Range Road
is open it doesn't follow that Tyneham village is open you must check the MOD website and
I'll put a link in the description for you. From the Turning for Tyneham you
drive two miles south along this road This is the only road in and out of Tyneham Village
and it is narrower even still than the MOD Range Road, there is a free public car park at the
Village end of this road. Let's take a look at a panoramic sweep of the Village from the high
ground just to the west of the village itself A point I would emphasize whilst you look at the
Panorama, is you are very restricted where you can go in Tyneham Village. This is due that a very
real risk of unexploded ordnance in uncleared areas. While the main village is fully accessible
the periphery buildings and surrounding Farm areas are not. Don't worry about this, stick to the
safe areas which are very clearly marked and obey all the signs, and just don't climb any
fences. And let's get out about on foot; and this then is the footpath that leads through
the churchyard from the Baltington access track Although most of the graves here date from the
1800 and early 1900s, there was a grave here that was as recent as 2003 which
I presume is one of the original residents of Tyneham who has passed away
and has asked to be buried in a churchyard. Surprisingly I didn't find any World
War One Graves, here bearing in mind that the village lost 12 men in war but
I presume that's because they're all buried in Commonwealth
War graves in Flanders itself. The flagpole and Union Jack flying have been put
there by the Army. It wasn't in the original Village but it does mark the center of the
village; and it's nice to see the union jack flying Although the village is not busy don't
expect to have this place to yourself you will get other visitors here, but it
is well off they've beaten tourist track This street is the center of the village
and it's known as The Row or Post Office Row, and you can also hear the Brook
running into the village Pond from here Let me put this scene into historical context
for you using Apple Final Cut Pro [Music] Although Tyneham never benefited from Mains
electricity or running water, modernity did arrive in the year 1929 in the form of a Village
telephone situated outside the Village Post Office the telephone was housed in a K1 General
Post Office telephone box introduced in 1920. The Village was evacuated before the Post Office
got around to renewing the telephone box with a more familiar and quintessentially British K2 red
phone box. Inside the phone box is an original A and B button pay telephone; and information
from 1943 including War security information This is one of only four surviving K1 phone boxes
still in situ in the UK . We're now entering into the post office which is number three The Row
the road took its name for the Terrace of four houses sequentially numbered nearest the church
to furthest out, number one was the schoolhouse number two The Labourers Cottage, number three The
Post Office which we're in now and Number Four The Shepherd's Cottage. Originally built around
1850 they were initially thatched roofed and then tiled in 1880. With a few exceptions most buildings in
the village are now like this, just brick shells The more notable buildings have info boards for
historical narrative, like this one in the post office Many buildings though are structurally
unsound and they are fenced off. The Row is different because you can actually explore
The Row, it's safe to walk inside and outside. Just to the left of the flagpole is Number One
at The Row which was known in Tyneham as The Schoolhouse , it was the home of the Village School
mistress until 1932, when the Village School closed To the right to the flagpole
is this memorial stone which commemorates the planting of a tree in 1911
to commemorate the coronation of King George V I think it's quite interesting to illustrate
that this tree was planted the same year that this photograph of Helen Taylor was
taken, who we've met a few times now And now look at the size of the tree 111 years on slightly to the right of the 1911 tree is the
village Fountain built in the year 1853 by the Reverend John Bond and it supplied piped
water from a nearby artificial reservoir it was the second water source the village after
the village well and typically it was described with a Bible quotation from John 4th. The best
preserved building in Tyneham is a village church it is a grade two-listed building now and is a
museum and monument now rather than a place of worship Although there's been a church here since the
1300s this building dates from the 17th and 18th century and has had many alterations
over time and now let's transition from a modern view to a postcard view from 1933. Okay
so let's take a walk through the internals of the church ... this is exactly how you would
have found the church in December 1943. But also the church now functions as the village's
Museum ; and the entrances are bedecked with numerous info boards about the history of
the village and the families who lived here. As we exit the church via the southern
door we're now going to look across the graveyard and towards Tyneham's second
best preserved building The Village School the village Schoolhouse was built in the
year 1856, originally with a capacity of 60 kids, but by the mid-1920s the child numbers
had dropped to the point where the school was no longer economically viable; and it closed
in the year 1932. The building was then used as a village hall for the next 10 years until
the village was evacuated in December 1943. As a grade two listed building the Village
School was well protected along with the church and in 1994 the internals were restored to how the
Village School would have looked in the mid-1920s Everything in this school is original
late 1800s to early 1920s and it's worth remembering the school never
had any electricity so heating in the winter months was via a coal stove and
lighting by oil lamps hung from the ceiling In common with all schools of the early 20th
century centerpiece over the fireplace is a picture of the King; King George V who would have
been the ruling Monarch at the time of school was active and slightly left of that a picture of
his grandmother Queen Victoria who died in 1901. [Music] it is sad that the Army and MOD didn't take the opportunity to preserve
the whole of Tyneham like they did the church and the Schoolhouse; as when you step outside you'll
find that most of the houses in the village are now only ruins and because they are structurally
unsound are also fenced off for safety reasons Each house has their own unique history
that I don't really have time to tell in this video but you'll still get a
good sense of the layout of the village Even if for range safety reasons you can't venture
far from the center of the village [Music] Whilst the village mainly consisted of small
stone-built cottages for the working class, it also featured some elaborate high-end houses for
the well-off and landed gentry. This building is The Rectory; the rectory was built in the
year 1853 by the Reverend Nathaniel Bond. The rectory had pride of place in the village and had
sweeping views across the whole valley. Sadly after evacuation; in the year 1966, The Rectory burnt
to the ground, now today with his upper levels demolished and now overgrown with vegetation, it is
hard to picture how this building looked in 1943. [Music] On the east side of the village are The Laundry
Cottages , which were the only dwellings in the village to have running water supplied by a spring
These Cottages were also the location of the village laundry run by the Taylor family; two of whom we've
met already: Emily Taylor who lost all three of her sons in World War One and Helen Taylor who left
the final note on the church door in December 1943. And finally to complete our tour of
central Tyneham we're going to go past The Gwyl Cottages to the south of the
village, these until 1942 were the home to the Grant family, and then in 1942 to 1943
they were leased out to visiting army officers [Music] We're now going to leave the village and
walk up to one of the few visitable remote buildings: Tyneham Farm which is to the
South east of the Village , by about 300 meters Although sadly The Farmhouse itself
is no longer standing, most of the farm Courtyard , Barns and Stables are still
extant, and are in very good condition They have been recently restored internally
with farm equipment of the period There's been a farm here in Tyneham
for centuries, but in particular in recent history the farm estate was run
from 1860 to 1940 by the Smith family and then taken over in 1940 by Sydney Churchill... no
relation ... until the Army closed the farm in 1943. Although admittedly some of the farm equipment
here is not originally from Tyneham having been sourced by local
historians and placed here in the past 15 - 20 years. Much of it is! Such
as this restored Hay Wagon in the barn Another interesting artifact is this rusted 1930s
era agricultural tractor, which presumably in 1943 was broken down and was too difficult to remove; and
probably formed part of a compensation claim by the farmer. I have to say I found walking through the
barns quite eerie!! Unlike maybe the church and the school... walking through the farm really does make
it feel like everybody just upped and left in 1943 For completeness we're gonna walk out now along the
Army authorized track to Worbarrow Bay about one and a half miles south of Tyneham, it
takes about half an hour to get there On your 30-minute walk you will encounter a
few isolated dwelling building shells like this one. This one's is called Gate Cottages Worbarrow itself was a small fishing Hamlet on the English Channel and separate to Tyneham, although
the two communities were more or less the same they used to be about seven Cottages here
and a coast guard station which closed in 1911. I'm actually filming from the
site of the old Coast Guard Station During the 1930s Worbarrow Bay was a popular
spot for a day trip from surrounding Dorset or just a pleasant place to spend a summer's
afternoon for the residents of Tyneham This is a panoramic shot looking back towards
Tyneham and the way we've walked out, taken from the top of the rocky spur over Pond field
Cove, this probably wasn't my best decision of the day as I slipped in the mud and nearly went over
the edge however I survived to tell the tale... and this is a shot now looking towards the old Coast
Guard Station. The first evidence that World War II was going to affect Tyneham can be found in
these anti-tank Dragon's Teeth installed on the approach path from the beach in 1940. These were
installed to prevent Hitler's forces using the beach to land tanks in the expected German invasion
.. Operation Sea Lion... that thankfully never came! If nearly falling off Pondbury spur for YouTube content
was not enough sacrifice, I then also decided to trek about a mile and a bit to the West up a very
steep ridgeline to get you a view back towards Worbarrow Bay, and to have a look at this World
War II era Lookout post, installed around 1940 the same time as a dragon's teeth, it is a lookout
post as opposed to a pill box , but it is still armored Traipsing back along the Purbeck ridge line back
towards Tyneham can get a really good view of this building complex that is
in an EOD uncleared zone and therefore sadly off limits. Baltington Farm or Baltiington Hall located
about half a mile from the Village Center Baltington started off in the mid-1600s as a manor
house, but by 1774 it was listed as just a farm This is how Baltington Farm looked in 1943 and
it was home to the Longman family. You could consider Baltington as the Western rival
to the east sides Tyneham Farm The only trace that Baltington was once
a manor house is an ornamental Pond just In front of the barn complex; again this is a
photo from 1943 much of those barns are now only ruins although the main structure still
stands in ruined form, as I said though it is in an EOD uncleared area and off limits. It would
be completely wrong of me to finish off our tour of Tyneham without mentioning Tyneham House which
theoretically should be the Jewell in the crown of our tour, however I can't show you the site as
it is in an EOD uncleared area, quite a distance away from the village and completely surrounded
by trees. Tyneham House was and theoretically still is to Manor House of Tyneham Village
built between 1563 and 1583 by Henry Williams The Bond family purchased Tyneham House and his
estate in 1683. There were then substantial alterations between the years 1700 and 1860.
Tyneham House was considered an architectural attraction, and this painting was done to
show it off by artist J.H le Keux in 1865. Like the rest of Tyneham it was World War II
that ultimately and indirectly caused Tyneham House's demise. This started in 1941 when the house
was requisitioned by the RAF to house WAAFs who worked at the nearby radar station; then after the
evacuation of Tyneham in 1943, the house rapidly fell into dereliction. Due to neglect by the MOD
this worsened and some architecturally historic salvage was removed , but in 1973 the house was in
such a state that the MOD demolished much of the structure. And this is how you'll find it today in
its off limits area surrounded by woodland. There isn't much left to see. I think the destruction
of Tyneham House is possibly the worst piece of cultural vandalism in the whole Tyneham Story
the house should have been protected in the same way the church was, and maintained for future
generations and that opportunity is now lost. Well as you probably tell from my wet demeanor
the weather has take a turn for the worse, it's heavy rain coming off the English Channel and I'm
going to call this video a day. So we will finish it on right exactly where we started, the center of
Tyneham. I hope you enjoyed this video and I hope you enjoyed Tyneham. It is a little piece of 1943
preserved at the bottom of an army range impact area Do I recommend you come here? Absolutely !
But do your research before you come here otherwise you'll be looking at wrecks
that don't really make much sense to you ... it is not Disneyland!! Also check the
MOD website for the access times. Usually it's at weekends... but not every weekend.
Or the Christmas closed down period. Well thanks for staying with me, again as ever if
you enjoyed this video please give me a Like and subscribe to the channel to find more World
War II history videos.... THANK YOU.... see ya, bye! [Music]
